


To Think That We Could Stay the Same

by auntieshakespeare



Series: The lovers, the dreamers, and me [4]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Adam (Voltron) Lives, Adam's last name is Weiss, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Comfort, Lotor (Voltron) Lives, M/M, Platonic Cuddling, Shiro (Voltron) is Bad at Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-30
Updated: 2019-03-30
Packaged: 2019-12-26 17:46:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18287204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/auntieshakespeare/pseuds/auntieshakespeare
Summary: In which rumors of Adam's death are greatly exaggerated and the entire plot is just cuddling.





	To Think That We Could Stay the Same

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Minnowlet because they deserve to feel good things. I would be lost without you, my friend.
> 
> This is part of minnowlet and my Voltron AU in which the many poor writing decisions of the staff and studio are reversed because we hate character death and love hurt/comfort. You don't need to read the pieces I've posted so far to understand this, it works very much as a standalone, but I do make reference to two important OCs, Hannah and Deborah, and you should know that in universe, they are Adam's moms. 
> 
> Title from Mitski's "Two Slow Dancers"

"Tokyo is back on the grid, Sir."

Two hours into yet another meeting on reconstruction and reconnection efforts and Veronica's news was the first interesting bit of information Shiro had heard. 

With Sendak dead, the majority of his forces had either fled or been subdued, so the Garrison could now afford to spend more resources on reforming society. Voltron and the remaining Blades were out in force rebuilding settlements and delivering seeds and farming supplies to farmers across the world. The downside to this was the endless bureaucratic nonsense that Shiro was forced to sit through day after day when all he longed to do was get his hands dirty planting trees or building bridges. 

"Excellent," Iverson sounded as pleased as he ever did, which is to say, hardly. "Patch them through to Berlin and Lagos as soon as possible. Is Moscow still struggling with interference?"

"Commander Iverson, Sir!" 

A young Garrison student, a first year by the looks of it, had burst through the command room doors, wide eyed and panting. "I have a message from Commander Holt! There's a large group of civilians in the Garrison hospital seeking medical care after being stranded in the desert during the Galra invasion. Lieutenant Weiss is with them."

Shiro is out of his chair before the words have fully left the cadet's mouth. 

"Shiro!" 

Allura's voice is indignant. She, like him, hates being grounded, would rather be in Blue actually assisting people, but just like him she's too highly ranked to be allowed to help. 

He doesn't respond, already out the door. 

The hospital is on Garrison grounds, the first building to be rebuilt after the war. It's a five minute jog from central command. Shiro makes it in three. 

He tears into the lobby, nearly upending Commander Montgomery on her crutches. He says nothing, just keeps up his mad dash until he reaches the information desk. 

"Where are the survivors?" 

The secretary's moss green eyes are the size of dinner plates and one of her hands flies to her phone in a panic.

"Sir, I'm going to need you to calm down or I'm going to call the police."

"I don't have time for this, please where are--"

"Takashi?" 

Colleen Holt's inquisitive voice catches him off guard and he spins around unbalanced, catching himself with his left hand, prosthetic knocking a stack of pamphlets off the desk in surprise.

"Ms. Holt!"

She rolls her eyes and says, "I'll handle him, Nadine, thank you." She beckons him to follow her towards the elevators and he trots behind her, heart pounding.

"A cadet said--"

"That Adam is here, yes I know. Where do you think we're going?" She gives him a patient smile, punching the button for the 8th floor while the doors close behind them. 

"He's--" Shiro cut himself off, gnawing on his lip nervously. The 8th floor was where Coran spent most of his time. It was the wing with almost exclusively Altean and Olkari tech and housed their most seriously injured survivors, including Lotor. 

"He's fine. Dehydrated, undernourished, beat to hell, but he's fine."

"They said his plane _blew up_."

Colleen wrapped both of her hands around his right hand, lips turned up as she spoke to him in a way that reminded him of all the sweetness of Hannah Weiss and all the carefully withheld frustration of Deborah Weiss. "Takashi. Breathe. I'd warn you if I was about to escort you to a corpse. He's fine. Sam just figured he'd want a little privacy."

The elevator doors open and Colleen leads them to the left, down the hallway where Lotor lay comatose. Three doors from the end, she stops, gesturing to a private room, door ajar slightly. 

"I'll be at the nurse's station if you need me, okay?" 

He nods, giving her a tight smile before returning his gaze to the door. 

It has been...years. God. Literal years since he's seen Adam. There was their tense conversation in the apartment, the screaming match that lead to him packing a bag and crashing at Matt's house before moving his stuff out entirely. The angry breakup sex that only made everything worse. Adam didn't come to the launch. And then. Capture.

What if he didn't want to see Shiro? What if he did but he was...disappointed? Would he be angry at Shiro for leading the Galra here? For getting him hurt? 

_Unproductive thoughts, Takashi_ Hannah's voice said in his head. He shook them off, took a deep breath. Released. He pushes the door open gently.

"I don't have any more blood for you to take. If you want some, go find it in the desert on some Galran corpse, you vampires."

Adam is sitting up in bed, reclined slightly, face drawn and clearly irritated. His nut brown skin is a patchwork of cuts and bruises, bandages apparent beneath his shirt. An IV pumps fluids into his arm, the drip a familiar sight. There are dark circles beneath his warm brown eyes and his hair is in its natural state for once, curly and free, longer than he normally keeps it.

It's clear he'd been through hell, but he looks...amazing. 

"Adam." 

There is so much he needs to say, but Adam's name is the only thing that seems important, the only name he wants on his lips. After the breakup he hadn't let himself say it and when they got back to earth and he thought Adam was dead? He only said it in apology, in grief.

This felt like a blessing. 

Adam's head snaps up, eyes wide. "Takashi!"

Shiro crosses the room in three quick strides, throwing himself into the bed inelegantly. As kids, Adam was always so gentle, climbing into Shiro's hospital bed with a practiced grace, but Adam was alive and Shiro--

Shiro was kissing him, holding his face between two hands that had done nothing but kill and destroy since he flew to Kerberos to fulfill his childhood dream. He peppers kisses across Adam's face, familiar and so damn beautiful. 

"Adam. Oh my god, I'm so sorry."

He was crying now, tears obscuring his vision of the only person he wanted to see in this moment. His left hand clenched in Adam's hospital gown as he tried to calm himself.

"Only you would apologize for me being alive, Takashi you bastard," Adam said, pulling Shiro back into a wet kiss. He pulls away after a moment, wiping the tears off of Shiro's face with his thumbs. 

"That's not what I--"

"I know what you meant and you don't get to apologize for it. Any of it. Just shut up and let me hold you, Puppy." 

A wet, cracking gasp tore it's way out of Shiro's chest. It had been so long. He shook a little in Adam's arms, letting tears fall as he sunk slowly into stillness. 

He breathed in time with Adam, head resting against his bandaged chest while Adam pets his hair softly. The silence stretches on, almost restful, a gentle reunion. Finally, voice scratchy, Adam asks, "So. White hair, huh gramps?" 

"Trauma."

Adam snorts at that. "Shoulda looked like this as a kid, then." 

"It was...sudden. I had a white streak for a while. Very punk rock Rogue."

"Sorry I missed it, cher."

They laugh together and Shiro finally feels capable of sitting up. He pulls away from Adam with a sigh, sitting up and turning away, feet to the floor, face looking down at his lap.

"I shouldn't have kissed you."

Adam's sigh is weary, an exhaustion deeper than a year in the desert. "It's okay."

"No, it's not. I. I broke up with you. I didn't listen, I just went out to space and ended up leading the Galra here and basically destroying civilization. People died, Adam. You almost died."

"You don't get to decide what I find acceptable. And you definitely don't get to blame yourself for an alien invasion. Unless your name is Zarkon or Sendak and I somehow never knew, you didn't make that decision."

"I killed people Adam." He looks up from his lap, expression pained, "I killed hundreds of people. I almost killed _Keith._ "

Adam's expression softens and he scoots himself across the bed to sit next to Shiro, feet clad in ugly yellow hospital socks touching the floor next to his boots. 

"He forgave you, I bet."

His right arm clenches and Adam reaches over and wraps his hands around it, just like Colleen. 

"I know you're used to people giving up on you, but the people who truly love you? We never will, regardless of what you do or try to blame yourself for. I told you when we were kids, I'll never leave you. I mean it. I know Kogane feels the same. We're here for you, we'll always forgive you. We'll always love you."

That's too much to think about right now when Shiro's head is still spinning from Adam's return and his heart is still aching over Keith's absence.

"Shouldn't I be comforting you?" he asks, in lieu of a proper response. 

Adam grins, "This fancy hand looks like it gives pretty good massages, if you really want to make it up to me."

He feels himself turn red and Adam throws his head back in a laugh that warms him down to his toes. 

They trade light banter and soft kisses back and forth over the course of the next hour until Adam starts to drift off. 

"Alright, let's lay you down," Shiro says, already gathering his ex into his arms to tuck him back into bed before he can protest. 

"Mmm, don' want to sleep," he complains, eyes shutting involuntarily, as Shiro adjusts his head on the pillow. "Just got you back."

"I'm not leaving," Shiro says quietly, toeing off his boots and stripping out of his bulky uniform jacket before slipping into bed behind Adam. 

"Better not." 

Shiro drops a kiss to his temple. There's so much they need to work out together and individually. Shiro still has nightmares, has panic attacks when he thinks too long about whether he's real or not. And there's Keith, of course. The heavy longing he feels in his chest when Keith is around, the fluttering in his guts. The guilt about it all. He's a mess, but he's not worried about fixing it all tonight.

For now, they can rest.

"I love you, Adam."

Adam sniffs, lets out a long sigh before snuggling into Shiro's chest. "Love you too, Kashi. Always."

They drift.

**Author's Note:**

> It's 5 am where I live and I have bronchitis, so I'm ignoring any grammatical errors I've made until I've slept some.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


End file.
